


Ways to Save the World

by palmtreelights



Category: Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, Power Rangers
Genre: Canon Character of Color, Difficult Decisions, Female Character of Color, Friendship, Gen, Male Character of Color, Secrets, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-25
Updated: 2014-08-25
Packaged: 2018-02-14 17:13:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2200155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palmtreelights/pseuds/palmtreelights
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Combat or conference--the decision to undertake one or the other is not so simple.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Ways to Save the World

When Kimberly is throwing her empty bottle of water into the recycling bin, Trini flips to one of the sheets of paper tucked into her biology textbook. Reading the heading makes her breath catch, as if that alone is enough to proclaim to the entire park that she’s wondering what her life would be like if she stopped being a Power Ranger.

She snaps the book shut as Kimberly heads back, her eyes catching the word _application_ before she glances up at her friend.

“I think I’m done studying for today,” Kimberly says, sitting across from Trini on their blanket.

“Me, too.” Setting her book down on her lap, Trini nods. “We should be okay for class tomorrow.”

“ _More_ than okay,” Kimberly insists. “I’m going to have nightmares if I read anymore.”

They laugh, but it does little to soothe Trini’s nerves. She shouldn’t have brought it with her, much less peeked at it. Paper doesn’t just walk away and reveal its contents to the world—well, not unless Zedd casts a spell on it, but Trini is pretty sure he prefers to create his monsters from more interesting things than a sheet of paper.

Come to think of it, she’d be less anxious about fighting one of Zedd’s monsters right now. She’s gotten so used to having quiet days interrupted by their enemy on the moon that she glances up now, looking for the putties that will inevitably appear.

“Earth to Trini?”

She whirls her head to face Kimberly, and her friend frowns at her.

“Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” Trini assures her, nodding. Her friend smiles back, but her frown doesn’t disappear. Glancing at the cover of her book, Trini takes a deep breath. “Kim, can you keep a secret?”

“Of course.” She sidles closer, lowering her head as if to shield them both from the world. “What’s up?”

Spreading her fingers over her textbook, Trini says, “I’ve been thinking about—about the ways we do good in the world. ‘We’ as in all people, not just us.”

“Like the peace conference?”

Trini’s heart skips a beat. There’s no way Kimberly knows what she’s keeping pressed between the pages of her book. “Yeah,” she answers, nodding. “What we do as Rangers is incredible, you know, fighting off monsters, saving the world every other day…”

“But?”

“Well, we may stop monsters from space, but what about the monsters among us?”

Frowning, Kimberly sits up a bit. “We do what we can, right? Recycling, clean-up projects, protests—”

“Right.” Trini smiles. Kimberly gets it. She understands Trini’s love for the planet, for their community, always standing by her side to fight against corporations dumping toxic chemicals into the water supply or to help set up a recycling program. She’ll understand, then, why Trini grabbed an application from the principal’s office even as her communicator went off and reminded her of her responsibilities here.

“That’s not a secret,” Kimberly tells her, smiling a little, cautious. “Everybody knows that’s what you like to do, and everybody thinks it’s great.”

“But what if we could do more?” she asks, sighing as the next question rings in her mind: _What if_ I _could do more?_

“Maybe when we finally defeat Zedd for good. I mean, he can’t keep this up forever, right?”

“Neither can we. I don’t mean to sound morbid,” Trini adds quickly as Kimberly frowns again. “I just mean—we’re going to go to college someday, right? And we could end up going anywhere.”

Kimberly laughs, the sound breathy and light and relieved. “Oh, I never thought of that!” Her laughter fades, and a shadow settles over her eyes, and she repeats, more quietly, “I never thought of that.”

“I’m sorry,” says Trini. That makes up her mind. She tucks her book into her backpack, forcing away the thought of Geneva, of working for global harmony and understanding. She has work here, in Angel Grove. “I was just looking at schools abroad with good ecology programs.” She hates to lie, but it’s better than the truth. College is still a ways away. The peace conference is in a month.

Standing, she holds out her hand to Kimberly. “Come on, let’s clean up here. I’ll buy you a shake at the youth center.”

Kimberly pretends to be angry for a moment, but then she smiles and takes Trini’s hand. Trini pulls her up, steps off the blanket, and starts to put their plastic containers in her tote bag.

“Hey,” says Kimberly.

Trini looks up from her work. The shadow hasn’t quite left her friend’s face, but she’s smiling again.

“There’s plenty of time between now and college for us to beat Zedd,” states Kimberly. “Everything’s going to be okay by then, you’ll see, and then you can bring me great souvenirs when you come home for vacation.”

“Of course I will,” Trini says, and laughs.

* * *

 

Billy is at school working on the schedule for the peace conference in a few weeks, Tommy is at a karate competition hosted by Stone Canyon High, and Kimberly is at her father’s house for dinner, which leaves Zack, Trini, and Jason to claim the usual table at the youth center. It’s covered in notebooks and history textbooks and three half-full cups of different smoothies. Zack underlines a term in his review notes, scratching his cheek as he recites the information under his breath, and Trini stares at the dates she’s highlighted in her own notes. Bright yellow, brighter than her Ranger color, but not nearly as important. This is where she has to be, right? She loves being a Ranger, loves knowing that she’s helped keep the world going for over a year now, so why does that sheet of paper weigh so heavily in her backpack?

Jason comes over, a chorus of good-byes walking past him on their way to the door.

“Good karate class?” Zack asks, glancing over his shoulder at the kids.

Trini follows his gaze, watches the kids all leave with their parents, who have waited patiently by the exit for the past ten minutes.

“Great,” answers Jason, taking his seat at the table.

“They’re such good kids,” Trini remarks.

“Yeah. A lot better than I was at their age.” Jason shakes his head, laughing. “Anyway, what’d I miss?”

“Nothing,” mutters Zack. “Not even Bulk and Skull have come by to be annoying.”

Jason shrugs and takes a sip of his smoothie. “Slow day. Not bad, for a change.”

Trini chuckles, and as the sound fades, the TV on the counter plays a commercial for the peace ambassador program. For the entire half minute it airs, she is transfixed, watching it with both fear and yearning. She remembers, suddenly, the day of her first praying mantis style kung-fu lesson, how she wanted nothing more than to go back to her old, familiar forms and embrace this different style all at once.

“Man,” says Zack, a few seconds after a car commercial has begun. “That’s pretty cool, isn’t it?”

“Really?” asks Jason, tearing his gaze off the TV to grin at Zack. “I never pictured you as an SUV person.”

Zack rolls his eyes, laughing. “I meant the peace conference.”

“It’s really cool,” says Trini, glancing at the backpack at her feet.

Zack grabs his drink, and Jason flips a page in his history book. In the silence that falls over them, she can hear her own heartbeat.

“Guys,” says Jason, his voice soft.

Trini and Zack look up as he grabs his notebook and pulls out a folded sheet of paper. He sets down his notebook and holds the sheet in both hands, narrowing his eyes for a moment before unfolding it and setting it in the center of the table, atop a library book Trini had pulled for this study session.

She gasps, quiet, as she reads the familiar heading. With barely a thought, she reaches down for her backpack, pulls out her biology textbook, and flips through it. She hears a rustling of pages that isn’t coming from her, and when she holds up the paper for her friends to see, Zack is doing just the same.

Three applications, all filled out and ready to go, folded away and hidden from prying eyes until now.

“I tried to tell Kim,” says Trini, setting the application over her notes and covering it with her hands. “But I just couldn’t.” She sighs, and she realizes that suddenly it’s much easier to breathe.

“I haven’t even bothered trying to tell anyone,” says Jason. “Except now.”

“Yeah, me too,” says Zack.

“Seemed like as good a time as any,” Jason adds, shrugging, as if that explains everything.

As if Trini and Zack don’t understand exactly how he feels.

“I don’t want to abandon the team,” says Zack, his voice just loud enough for only them to hear. “And it’s not like we’re not doing a lot for the world already. But—”

“There’s more than one way to help the world,” Trini adds, nodding.

Jason leans forward, both elbows on the table, grasping his hands together as if that will keep him from falling apart and spilling all he thinks, all he feels, all he wants. Maybe they need him to, Trini thinks, just like they needed him to be the brave one, to share his secret and help unburden them all.

“We’re fighting monsters, right, almost every day, it feels like—but there are still people going hungry. There are still kids who can’t go to school, parents whose babies die days after they’re born, people who kill other people just because they look different or pray differently or grew up somewhere other than where they are now.” He sighs, frowning, but not confused. He is thinking like a leader.

“It even happens here,” Zack adds, “and this is supposed to be one of the better places to live.”

“And what we do out there,” Jason continues, nodding at Zack, “it helps, but it’s not putting an end to all these other problems.”

“No one can do enough,” Trini says. “We’ve done it one way for so long, but maybe—maybe we can do more.” She exhales sharply, as if they’ve all been in a trance and she’s the first one to break free of it. “If we even get selected. If we even apply.”

“Should we?” asks Zack. “Do you think Zordon and the others would be upset?”

“Got nothing to lose by applying, right?” says Jason, but his posture is still tense. “Worst that can happen is—I don’t know, really. What’s worse, getting picked and having to leave, or not getting picked?”

“We’ll never know unless we try.” The words tumble out of Trini’s mouth unbidden, surprising even her. That’s the answer, isn’t it? Nothing ventured, nothing gained.

“You’re right,” says Jason. He looks as spooked as Trini feels. “You’re right.”

They are quiet for a few moments, their discussion echoing in their minds, soft and insistent, gentle and true. The decision is not simpler now, but it is clearer, and it is no longer frightening because she is not alone. She has trusted Zack and Jason for as long as she has known them, and even more now that they are her teammates. If the risk of dying in the fight for Earth is one they take every day, then surely this is something they can do, right?

“I still have to write my essay,” she murmurs, and though she’s frightened by admitting that she has finally made her choice, she does not lower her gaze.

“Me, too,” says Zack.

Jason nods. “Okay. We go home, we write our essays, we submit our applications. Then… whatever happens, happens.”

Trini nods, and finally, she lets herself begin to feel excited. If they aren’t chosen, then they’ll continue to do good here, in the best way they can. And if they are, or if only one or two of them are, then they’ll support one another as far as they can. No one will punish them for their choice, because their goal is, at its core, the same. Whether in they’re all in this city or scattered across the globe, they are a team, and together, they will work for a better world.


End file.
